Know where to run. Know where to hide.
A new analysis by Transportation Alternatives reveals where the 10 most-dangerous drivers are terrorizing our streets — carving a swath of potential destruction and danger across the entire city.
The analysis of speed-camera tickets from 2024 shows that each region has one or two super-scofflaws all its own. The worst driver — who plies his pernicious trade in a black Audi with license plate LCM8254 — got 563 tickets last year, almost all of them in Sheepshead Bay. He even got 73 tickets at the same intersection on Ocean Parkway (remember that detail, it becomes important later).
Another driver with license plate LHR1977 — call him the Menace of Manhattan — got 474 speeding tickets last year in a Mercedes-Benz. While the driver mostly terrorizes Broadway and 68th street, there were violations up and down the west side of the island endangering pedestrians from Chinatown to Harlem with no regard for human life.
Fines alone don't deter these dastards. Of the top 10, three have paid off all or most of their fines, ranging from $17,000 to $45,000. And the other seven have simply ignored the fines and owe the city a combined total of $200,000. It's unclear whether a single one of them has ever been towed or booted.
“These results point to a small population with a shocking pattern of recidivism, resistance to traditional deterrents, and disregard for human life,” said TA Executive Director Ben Furnas.
Just as great minds think alike, Streetsblog was also working on a visualization of the 2024 camera data and the city's worst drivers. Ours, by data journalist Michael Cahana, shows how these top ranking scofflaws compare to the rest of the city's offenders. Scroll through to see in incredible detail how individual drivers wreak havoc on certain neighborhoods.
The deep dive into the city’s worst drivers comes after recidivist speeder Miriam Yarimi ran a red light on Ocean Parkway last month, brutally killing Natasha Saada and her two daughters Diana and Deborah, and leaving her young son in critical condition. The city's worst driver had gotten tickets last year very close to that stretch.
Driving such as his and Yarimi's sparked an outcry from advocates and members of the public who want to see legislators get dangerous drivers off the road, especially since their behavior is known and their locations tracked.
“A few weeks ago, one of those [recidivist] drivers sped through a red light and killed a mother and her two young daughters, near my neighborhood in Brooklyn — a crash that could have been prevented if the New York State legislature had taken action on common sense legislation,” said Amber Adler member of Families for Safe Streets. "This report provides a road map to where we can predict the most reckless drivers will eventually kill someone unless Albany acts this session."
Adler’s dream is passage of the so-called “Stop Super Speeders Bill,” S7621, which was introduced last year by state Sen. Andrew Gounardes (D-Bay Ridge). The bill proposes using “speed limiter” technology to modify the cars of drivers who get six or more automated enforcement tickets in a 12-month period. The devices would allow them to keep driving, but render it impossible for them to speed.
Studies have shown that drivers who rack up these tickets are more likely to kill or injure New Yorkers. In a Department of Transportation review of dangerous driving behaviors across New York City from 2017 to 2022, vehicles that had acquired more than 20 speed camera violations over the course of one year were five times more likely to be in a crash that resulted in death or severe injury than the ordinary driver.
For advocates, these statistics show the need for legislation.
“Luckily, we have a solution that will keep New Yorkers safe, [a bill] that would require speed limiters in the vehicles of the worst-of-the worst repeat offenders. It’s time for Albany to pass this legislation now before the next deadly crash,” said Furnas.
But some in the state legislature aren’t so keen on the bill. Assembly Member Michael Novakhov, who represents the area of Ocean Parkway where Yarimi killed the Saada family, told Streetsblog that he did not support the bill, arguing that six speeding tickets in a year was not excessive. Data shows that 74 percent of those who got automated enforcement tickets maxed out at two.
Hiding the plates
After fatal crashes, Streetsblog is often the only news outlet to check for a plate and to run it through the Department of Finance's database of tickets.
After Amanda Servedio was killed biking to her Astoria home from a group ride last year, the plate was later found and appeared in photographs. Running the plate revealed that the driver who hit and killed her had 80 camera-issued speeding or red-light tickets since mid-2022.
But finding the plates is a game of chance. The NYPD does not include the license plate number in its publicly released crash reports for road fatalities nor does it include license plates in its public dataset of collisions. Because of this, the public can't cross reference the collision data with the automated enforcement data, making it impossible to know which drivers are causing the most crashes.
Brian Howald, a street safety advocate who created a user-friendly version of the city ticket database called How's My Driving NYC, says that the public wouldn't need the power to analyze data if the government was using its tools proactively.
“It’s the job of DOT or the DMV to proactively be saying, ‘Does this data give us a better understanding of who is likely to hurt or kill someone driving in the future? And if so, what are we doing about that?’" said Howald. "We're just giving people more camera tickets with no bearing on their ability to continue driving a car. There's really no one who's trying to analyze that data in city or state government and to come up with solutions to that proactively."
Gounardes's bill is one attempt to use the vast troves of data the state has on these drivers to force accountability and curb the reckless driving that is observed. There have been attempts at the city level to do the same thing by different methods. Comptroller Brad Lander championed the Dangerous Vehicle Abatement Program when he was a Council member. The law allowed DOT to send drivers with 15 or more speeding tickets in any 12-month to a safety course, but the City Council allowed the law to expire without a replacement in late 2023.
